


Don't Ever Let Go

by MyrsineMezzo



Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: Entrapdak, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Mild Smut, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Sharing a Bed, lots of permission asking, more of a make out
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-06
Updated: 2020-06-06
Packaged: 2021-03-04 05:40:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,867
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24578437
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MyrsineMezzo/pseuds/MyrsineMezzo
Summary: Hordak has a hard time feeling worthy of Entrapta or his new life in Dryl. Thoughts of being taken over by Horde Prime keep resurfacing, but Entrapta is there to give him what he needs and helps him find a way to move forward. Mostly Hurt/Comfort ...ok and some gentle not-quite smut when they share a bed for the first time.God, I love that emo space bat.
Relationships: Entrapta/Hordak (She-Ra)
Comments: 23
Kudos: 234





	Don't Ever Let Go

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first She-Ra fic, but I just marathoned the show, and Entrapdak is the greatest thing ever!! Hope you enjoy, and thanks for reading. Comments are always super welcome if you feel like it :) And feel free to follow me over on tumblr at myrsinemezzo.

It could all be blamed on lettuce when it came down to it. 

Entrapta had explained Princess Perfuma's idea that they could grow their own 'vegetables.' Then Dryl's chef could make the tiny food its princess loved so dearly even better and more efficiently. And efficiency was something Entrapta and Hordak both prized when it came down to it. 

Hordak couldn't ever seem to remember the cook's and the other inhabitants' names even on one of his good days, and he didn’t truly understand the desire for anything but simple rations, either. However, he missed the feeling of tools and technology beneath his clawed fingertips, so he acquiesced to the plan to assist in building the irrigation system Entrapta had designed for his new home in Dryl.

Now, he stood in front of a metal workbench in one of the many rooms dedicated to machinery and ongoing experiments. Entrapta was still enamored with the remaining First Ones and Horde tech lying around from Horde Prime's invasion, and she had mentioned she was going out to retrieve more tools and circuitry from one of the many abandoned military terminals that afternoon.

"I'll be back soon," she had exclaimed while digging through a box of discarded pieces and parts before grabbing a double-sided axle grinder. "Don't do anything too fun without me!"

Then she was gone, and Hordak was once more alone with his thoughts, whether he wanted to be or not.

As he worked, his mind took over, playing through recent events again and again despite his attempts to focus on the tubes and wires that lay before him. It had been more than a month since the events of the Battle for Etheria, but instead of feeling better, somehow Hordak felt worse than ever. Thoughts kept intruding no matter how he tried to block them out: that he had failed where Horde Prime was concerned, that he was too damaged and unworthy to appreciate the good things springing up around him, and--most of all--that he did not deserve the good graces and cheerful exuberance of a certain purple-haired princess. Why had she offered to let him stay with her in Dryl? What could she possibly receive in exchange for his presence? 

It didn't make sense.

Hordak gripped his screwdriver harder and tried to push the thoughts away. Punishing himself for his weaknesses was something he was very familiar with, and he fell into the mental routine easily as he berated himself for his various shortcomings.

So great was his tension, a delicate piece of the metal he held in his hands buckled under the pressure he was exerting on it. He hissed in frustration, flinging it to the ground. 

"Useless," he muttered. Just like him.

And he _was_ useless, when it came down to it. He hadn't even managed to kill Horde Prime and save the one he held dear despite flinging his former "brother" over the edge of that platform into endless darkness. No, instead he had made things worse. It was only when She-Ra intervened and banished Prime's essence from his mind that Prime had truly been defeated.

And what it had been like when Prime had taken control of him... That was something he didn't think he would ever be able to put behind him. His consciousness had been pushed to the back of his mind, aware but unable to stop what was happening to himself or to Entrapta. Unable to keep Prime from gripping her beautiful tresses in his fist. He would never be able to forget the sensation of gripping her sensitive hair. Of being the cause of her pain. And the memory undid him, filling him with despair.

He realized as if from very far away that he had dropped his hands to the worktable. That he had come to a standstill, and that it was happening more and more often. Soon he wouldn't be able to hide this defect from anyone. He would be exposed and cast out once more if Entrapta knew what was good for her.

At the thought of her imminent rejection, he felt tears begin to trickle slowly down his face. He dashed them away with a low snarl and before he could stop himself, he swept all of his work to the floor in a crashing heap. Then he was sinking to the floor amid the rubble, his hands coming up to shield his face. He tried desperately to breath. To push the emotions flooding through him back into the pocket of his mind where they were less and less likely to stay despite his best efforts.

Weak. So very weak. 

To his horror, a sound crept through to his swiveling ears.

"H--Hordak?"

He cursed himself a thousand times over as he slowly responded to that voice, moving his hands away from his face to look into the concerned, magenta eyes of the princess whose presence usually dominated his waking and dreaming thoughts on his good days. Which was not today.

"Hordak. Are you alright?" Entrapta asked. Her hands were gripped into fists, and a lock of her lilac hair was reaching out tentatively as if unsure what to do in the face of his distress.

"I am fine," he said gruffly. "I simply...I simply..." 

He couldn't think how to finish that sentence. What could he possibly say to explain why he was on the floor, clearly tear-stained and incoherent.

"You're on the floor. And you seem upset?" she prodded gently. Evaluating. Gathering data. He felt a surge of something in his chest at the thought. Constant learning was what she did, and it was one of the things he valued most about her. One of the many things he valued about her, really.

"I am fine," he said again, unable to keep from repeating himself.

"Well, you don't seem fine," she said, her usually-chipper voice now cautious. "Were you thinking about something? About everything from before?"

He nodded, unable to speak for a moment.

Entrapta shifted slightly, coming closer to him until she reached his side and slid down onto the floor, her hair clearing a spot for her. She sat without speaking for a long moment, the ends of her prehensile pigtails twisting around themselves nervously as if wringing her hands.

"I think about it, too," she said slowly. "About everything that happened."

Hordak nodded slightly, unsure where she was going with this, and afraid that now was the moment where she would finally give voice to the blame and anger she must certainly be holding towards him to some small degree.

"I'm not good with feelings. You know that," she continued shyly. "But I know how to put pieces together. And the bits and pieces I've seen of you lately tell me you're unhappy."

He closed his eyes. It was coming. If he couldn't even be properly grateful to her for all she'd given him in his new home, then surely she would want him gone. He couldn't even put together an irrigation system without falling apart, for Prime's sake. He shuddered then at even the thought of Prime's name. 

So. Weak.

"It is difficult lately," he admitted, unsure of what else to say and uncomfortable in expressing even that much insecurity.

"Well, I might have a solution!" Entrapta's usually cheerful voice began to rise in excitement.

Hordak paused, feeling wary.

She began to ramble on quickly. "I talked to Adora a few days ago, and she said Catra's been having a hard time, too. I don't know if it's the same thing you're feeling or thinking about, but she keeps remembering Horde Prime controlling her and using her to hurt her friends. Adora says she doesn't like to admit it, but sometimes she just--" she broke off suddenly.

"She just...what?" His wariness was increasing exponentially.

"She just, well, she likes to be...y'know. Held." Entrapta turned to look at him then, the ends of her hair unknotting and the length nearest him rising to gently touch his shoulder. "We could do that. If it would help." Her voice had a questioning lilt to it, and she looked at him with hope and possibly even affection in her eyes.

Hope and affection. As if he were a lost pet that needed care and attention. A pet. Like that insufferable Swift Wind or that ridiculous owl creature that orbited one of those Star Siblings.

He couldn't help it. A harsh growl rose from his chest as he pulled away at the thought, rising so abruptly he stumbled a little.

"I am not pathetic like Catra," he snarled. "And I do not need nor want your pity." 

He turned abruptly, kicking a piece of machinery out of his way and stalking toward his bedroom. It was the only place he could be alone, and as he swept through its door, he barked "Out!" to the sleeping Imp who was curled in the middle of the bed.

Imp squinted at Hordak in irritation, but lifted himself up and began to flap his wings, soaring out the door. Hordak growled again and slammed the door shut behind him. 

"Hordak?" Entrapta called from outside. "I'm sorry if I said something wrong. I don't know what it was, but I'm sorry!" 

She sounded miserable, and he put his hands over his pointed ears to shut out the sound. He had done that. Making people miserable was all he was good for.

Throwing himself on the bed, he turned toward the blank wall and closed his eyes, trying to drown out the voice that said he ruined everything. That he would never be good enough--for Entrapta or for anyone or anything else.

After a long while, he felt himself sliding into the oblivion of sleep, and he welcomed it.

_Ah, little brother._

...

_Please take this affliction from me._

...

_I am Hordak, and I defy your will._

...

_You have forced my hand..._

Hordak cried out as he jerked awake, the sounds of Entrapta's screams ringing in his ears, the feel of her hair clear in his memory when he'd clutched it in his hand as he lifted her off the ground and she writhed in pain.

"Stop!" He pleaded, squeezing his eyes shut and shaking his head as he held his hands over his ears as they swiveled in distress. "Please stop!"

Suddenly, he felt something touch his shoulder. He whirled, his eyes flying wide as he swiped out with his claws.

"Ack!" Entrapta's voice rang through the air as she jerked back just out of reach. 

"Entrapta!" Hordak let his hand fall, horrified that he might have hurt her once more.

She looked down at him where he sat, fully upright now with his knees drawing up to his chest. "You were dreaming. It sounded so awful that Imp came to get me next door." 

She looked down as she fiddled with the ends of her hair, seeming uncomfortable. "Sorry for barging in. You seemed like you needed help, though." 

Her eyes met his and he looked away quickly.

"I am the one who is sorry," he began, but then he felt something once more touch his shoulder.

"Nothing to be sorry about," Entrapta said as she lightly stroked his shoulder with the end of a length of her hair. 

"That is not so," he protested. "Surely you cannot have forgotten what happened to you. What _I_ did to you while under Horde Prime's control. And this is how I repay you for your kindness. I should go," he finished, hanging his head.

The silence went on for so long that he finally turned to find Entrapta staring at him.

"That doesn't make sense," she said, her eyes widening. "You don't need to go. All the evidence says you need to stay!" She began to pace back and forth across the room, her locks flying through the air in distress. "You weren't in control when Horde Prime hurt me, were you?"

"Well...no," he said, watching her put on what he thought of as her thinking face. "But--"

She cut him off. "And you didn't know it was me just now, did you?"

"No, but--"

"And you've helped so much with Dryl and with my experiments, haven't you?"

"Entrapta!" He barked, frustrated that she wasn't listening to him.

She stopped, turning to face him.

He decided to lay everything on the table in front of her despite the imminent rejection that must surely follow. "I am not a good person, Entrapta. I have schemed, and hurt people, and I do not deserve anyone's kindness, let alone yours. I do not even know who I am apart from my brothers. Away from Prime."

"That may be true," she mused, and he flinched from the words. 

"And maybe you haven't been a very good person until now," she continued. "But what I do know is that you're my lab partner." 

He opened his mouth to protest.

"And, more importantly," she stopped him, looking him squarely in the eyes, "you're my friend."

He wilted.

"How can you say that after everything I did? I almost let Horde Prime win. I failed when I tried to stop him, and it put you in danger. You could have died!"

"But I didn't," she said triumphantly, putting her hands on her hips. "And now we can figure out a way for you to be yourself. We can find out who you really are without Horde Prime in the picture. Together." She paused. "If you want to, that is."

If he wanted to. And oh, how he did want.

"I would like that very much," he said slowly, raising his head and giving her a small smile to punctuate his words.

"Good, then!" she exclaimed, her hair shooting forward to squish his face affectionately between the two ends.

He reached up and ran his hand gently over the purple strands, trying to express his gratitude without words. It surprised him when she gave a shiver.

"That's, um. Nice," she said.

"Is it?"

"Yeah." She squinted her eyes at him, examining his face and tight body language. "Are you still upset?"

"I am still somewhat out of sorts," Hordak admitted.

"Maybe we should try the holding thing," she suggested, and he felt his breath catch.

"I suppose," he stuttered, unsure.

She approached him slowly, letting him scoot toward the wall to make room for her on the bed. It bent under her weight as she rested her knees on it and then lay down with her head on the pillow, opening her arms to him.

He didn't really know what to do next, but he inched slowly towards her until he lay stiffly in the circle of her arms, his head resting on her shoulder. Her hair surrounded them both. It smelled like some heady mixture of mechanical liquids and sunshine. He did his best not to breathe in that glorious scent too obviously.

"Is that better?" Entrapta asked, evaluating him as she gently prodded his arm with a finger. "You're very...tense."

"It is not bad. It is actually quite--" he thought about the sensations starting to spill down his limbs, "--nice."

"Well, that's good."

They lay there in silence for a while, her arms encircling him carefully but firmly.

Entrapta's voice broke the silence, although it was still gentle as she asked, "What is it that worries you most? Deep down?"

"Deep down?" Hordak repeated. "Deep down, it feels as if Horde Prime is winning, despite his destruction at the Battle for Etheria."

It felt as if a dam was breaking as he continued, the words spilling out of him. "I feel as if I will never again be who I was, and that I don’t even know who that was to begin with. I gave myself a name, but my being still revolved around Prime the entire time I lived in the Fright Zone." He hesitated, looking down at where their fingers had somehow become intertwined. "What am I now but a broken shell? I am more imperfect than ever before," he finished, unable to meet her eyes once more.

There was a long silence at his words and he felt felt true despair, then. He had divulged his weakness, and now she would spurn him for the faulty construct he was. Just as she should, he thought grimly, ready to pull his hand away. 

But a moment later, he felt a tendril of Entrapta’s hair touch his cheek. That lock of hair gently tilted his chin upwards until he was meeting her gaze with his own.

"Hordak..." she said softly, and he blinked. She had such beautiful eyes, he thought, and they were welling slightly with tears. The sight of what seemed like more pity ashamed him even more. He began to pull away, but her next words stopped him. 

"Do I really need to tell you how I feel about imperfection again?" she asked with what seemed to be genuine curiosity.

That startled a small laugh out of him. Entrapta smiled in return at the sound.

"I think it might take you a long time to be okay. I think it will take a long time for _me_ to be okay, too. But we have a long time to figure it out. We might get things wrong every once in awhile, but that's to be expected. It's like any experiment," she said, her voice beginning to rise with excitement. "You learn from the failed experiments way more than from the successful ones!"

He gave a small laugh at that, unable to hold it in. Slowly, he reached out and began to gently card his clawed fingers through the strands of her hair.

"Thank you," he said. "You are, as always, a surprise and a delight."

"That's good to hear," she said, although her voice was a little breathy.

"Is this alright?" he asked shyly, ready to stop immediately if she didn't like what he was doing.

"It's definitely alright. I don't think anyone's ever touched my hair quite like that before. People usually grab it or pull on it, but this isn't like that at all. This is really, really nice."

A pleased rumble sounded in his chest at the thought that he was making Entrapta feel good.

"Hordak?" she said, her voice sounding unsure but somehow still intent on something.

"Yes?"

"Do you maybe want to, I don't know...kiss me?"

He jerked back in surprise, his fingers pulling away from her hair. "K--Kiss you?"

She looked away. "You don't have to if you don't want to."

As if he wouldn't want to. Of course he wanted to, if it would please her. But he was nervous. He had never kissed someone before. He understood the mechanics of it, but it was never something clones would be allowed to do or even allowed to want to do.

"I want to," he assured her, and he scanned her waiting face when she turned back to face him. Then she was tilting his head up, up, up towards hers. Very slowly, and very gently, he brushed his lips against hers. They were so soft. He carefully pressed his lips against hers once more, increasing the pressure.

Then he pulled away. His eyes shot to her closed ones, terrified she would push him aside. That he would have done it wrong.

Instead, her eyes opened, and she breathed, "Oh. I liked that."

"You did?"

"Yeah. Did you?"

"I liked it very much," he admitted.

"Maybe we should try it again, then. We'll get better at it the more we practice."

"Very well."

Hordak leaned up and pressed his mouth to hers again, and this time she returned the gesture, her lips parting slightly. They lay that way for a long time, indulging in the experiment. He began to feel sensations he'd never felt before. Not just where their mouths met, but all over his body. It felt like light and warmth were filling him alongside the need to never stop. 

Not just the need to never stop, either, but the need to do something more. Whatever that might be. He wasn't sure, though, and he didn't want to ruin the moment. He knew she liked her hair to be touched in that particular, gentle way, and he began to run his fingers along her tresses.

Entrapta gave a low, pleased noise, her mouth opening more. He drank in the sound, his body warming even further. It was almost too much when she let her tongue drift along his bottom lip, and he pulled back, shocked.

"Too much?" she asked, breathing hard.

"No," he said, his voice lower than he'd ever heard it before. "That was also very nice."

"Oh good. I've seen other people kissing, and I've read a lot, and that seemed to be something they found pleasant," she said dreamily.

"Very pleasant."

"I agree. More?"

"Yes."

They returned to their kissing, this time carefully adding their tongues into the mix. It provoked more of a heady sensation than Hordak would ever have believed, and it was almost more than he could bear when she reached down and took one of his hands in hers before placing it on her waist.

"You can touch me if you want to," she said, her eyes darker than they had been a moment before. "That's supposed to be the next part."

"Alright," he agreed, panting slightly. He carefully traced his claws up and down her waist. Before long, he had reached just below the place where her coveralls met her breasts. He decided to be adventurous, and skimmed his fingers along their undersides.

Entrapta jerked in his arms, and he froze. "Oh wow," she gasped, pulling back to look down at his hand. "That's...that's..."

"Not right?"

"That's _extremely_ right. You're really good at this."

He felt a surge of satisfaction at her praise, and carefully stroked her again. His satisfaction surged even higher when she let out a small moan of pleasure.

It felt like the right moment to become even more adventurous with his hands, when a shrill alarm started blaring through the room.

They both jumped, pulling back and breathing hard as they stared at each other.

"What--?" Hordak gasped.

"Oh!" Entrapta exclaimed. "I forgot I set an alarm for dinner! We never eat at the same time, and I wanted to make sure we both did that. It seemed kind of fun to maybe eat dinner together, too." She looked a little shy about the suggestion.

"Ah." Suddenly, Hordak felt shy at the thought, too. "That is very kind of you. I would be happy to join you for dinner."

Entrapta's dark skin flushed a fetching shade of pink. "Maybe we could come back to this later, though? This experiment seems to be going really, really well."

"I would like that very much."

They sat up, putting themselves to rights and Entrapta climbed off the bed. She offered him a hand and he took it, letting her lead him out of the room and forward to a future where neither really knew what to expect, but that was what made it so exciting.

The End.


End file.
